Venues, part one

One of the most remarkable shows I’ve ever seen was in a punk bar in Austin, 2007. It looked like the inside of an old diner stripped of anything and everything. What could have once been a lunch counter was the bar. No windows, just vacant spaces inside empty window frames.

It looked like a fire had gutted the downstairs of structures and function, then been splashed with dull, black paint to remove any remaining color.

Not the sort of place you would imagine a most memorable show happeningEric Taylor album art.

The performer was Michelle Shocked. Sally Timms opened. The venue became part of the show in a way no other venue would have worked.

I’ll get back to that show later.

Small shows, small rooms have great potential for the most unique listening experiences.

Eric Taylor is being presented at one such show. The real deal from Houston, Texas, he picked up guitar stylings from Lightning Hopkins and Mississippi Fred McDowell among others. His songwriting and guitar picking influenced many of his contemporaries from those early days in Houston. They read like a Who’s Who of Texas songwriters, Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt, Robert Earl Keen, Lyle Lovett, Steve Earle, and Nanci Griffith.

Eric TaylorEric Taylor plays a house concert here in Rochester on Sunday, April 13, 2008, at 7:30 pm.